Data Transformation API: Convert CSV, JSON, XML Without Writing Code

#api #javascript #tutorial #webdev

Your data pipeline gets CSV from one team, JSON from another, XML from a legacy system. Here's how to handle all three without writing a single parser.

The Conversion Matrix

Most data pipelines need these transformations:

CSV → JSON  (most common: spreadsheet data into APIs)
JSON → CSV  (exporting for Excel/Sheets users)
XML → JSON  (legacy systems, SOAP services)
JSON → XML  (enterprise integrations)
CSV → XML   (rare but exists)

API-First Approach

import requests

# CSV to JSON
csv_data = """name,age,email
Alice,30,alice@example.com
Bob,25,bob@example.com"""

resp = requests.post("https://api.lazy-mac.com/data-transform/convert", json={
    "from": "csv",
    "to": "json",
    "data": csv_data,
    "options": {
        "header_row": True,
        "infer_types": True  # age becomes integer, not string
    }
})

result = resp.json()
# {"data": [{"name": "Alice", "age": 30, "email": "alice@example.com"}, ...]}

Handling XML from Legacy Systems

xml_data = """<?xml version="1.0"?>
<users>
  <user id="1">
    <name>Alice</name>
    <email>alice@example.com</email>
  </user>
</users>"""

resp = requests.post("https://api.lazy-mac.com/data-transform/convert", json={
    "from": "xml",
    "to": "json",
    "data": xml_data,
    "options": {
        "flatten_attributes": True,  # id attribute becomes a field
        "array_paths": ["users.user"]  # Always treat as array even with 1 item
    }
})
# {"users": {"user": [{"id": "1", "name": "Alice", "email": "alice@example.com"}]}}

ETL Pipeline Example

def etl_pipeline(source_url: str, target_format: str):
    # Fetch data (could be CSV export from Salesforce, XML from ERP, etc.)
    raw = requests.get(source_url).text
    source_format = detect_format(raw)  # "csv", "json", "xml"

    # Transform
    converted = requests.post("https://api.lazy-mac.com/data-transform/convert", json={
        "from": source_format,
        "to": target_format,
        "data": raw
    }).json()

    return converted['data']